Mexico nabs suspected cartel leader without a shot

Military officers escort alleged drug trafficker Vicente Zambada during his presentation to the media in Mexico City, Thursday, March 19, 2009. Vicente Zambada, arrested Wednesday in a upscale neighborhood in Mexico City, is the son of Mexican drug lord Ismael Zambada, head of the Sinaloa cartel. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)
— AP

Military officers escort alleged drug trafficker Vicente Zambada during his presentation to the media in Mexico City, Thursday, March 19, 2009. Vicente Zambada, arrested Wednesday in a upscale neighborhood in Mexico City, is the son of Mexican drug lord Ismael Zambada, head of the Sinaloa cartel. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)
/ AP

Vicente Zambada apparently rose through cartel ranks after supervising the unloading of cocaine from ships off the Mexican coast and verifying quantities coming from Colombia, according to the indictment.

Mexico's drug cartels are increasingly on the defensive as the U.S. and Mexico mount a cross-border crackdown.

After taking office on Dec. 1, 2006, Calderon sent thousands of soldiers and federal police to drug strongholds across Mexico in an attempt to bring warring gangs under control.

Cartels, already fighting each other for territory and drug routes into the U.S., responded with unprecedented violence, killing some 8,000 people. About 10 percent of victims were police or soldiers. The rest are believed to be linked to the drug trade, with some civilians caught in the crossfire.

On Thursday, seven people were found dead in western Mexico. They included three victims who were bound, shot and dumped on the side of a highway outside the city of Morelia; three dismembered and headless bodies found in plastic bags in a park in the city of Uruapan; and a police officer shot dead while walking to work in the port of Lazaro Cardenas.

On the sandy banks of a river in the resort of Acapulco, authorities uncovered a shallow grave with four young men who appeared to have been bound and hacked to death with machetes. In a separate incident, a 27-year-old man was shot to death inside a public bus.

The violence is now spilling over into the U.S., where drug-related kidnappings and killings are rising. Obama plans to come to Mexico City next month to discuss with Calderon how the two countries can work together better to confront the problems.